Brentford boss Thomas Frank has called for this weekend’s Premier League matches to be postponed in order to “break the chain” in light of rising Covid-19 cases and ensure Boxing Day fixtures go ahead.

Frank also believes next week’s Carabao Cup tie against Chelsea should be called off and revealed that 13 of the Brentford camp – players and staff – have tested positive this week, including four cases overnight.

But Bees striker Ivan Toney and defender Ethan Pinnock are back in the squad after recently testing positive and will be available for Saturday’s away match against Southampton if it goes ahead.

“We think that we should postpone the full round of Premier League games this weekend coming up,” said Frank.

“The Covid cases are going through the roof at all Premier League clubs. Everyone is dealing with it.

“To postpone this round and also the Carabao Cup round would give everyone a week to clean and do everything at the training ground so you break the chain in every club.

“We want to play. We want to carry on and we think it’s important that football keeps going.

“But this way (postponing this week’s games) we can have Boxing Day going, no problem. So we think it would be very sensible to do that.”

Frank also insisted clubs “should be much more open” about how many Covid cases they have and how many of those cases involve players.

Brentford’s match against Manchester United this week was postponed because of an outbreak at the Old Trafford club.

Meanwhile, neighbours QPR have had two of their Championship matches called off because of the number of Covid cases in the Rangers camp.